2008/02/27: BBC: New US climate offer ‘too little’A senior European official has described America’s latest offer on climate change as far too little, far too late. […] European climate experts are angry that the White House still refuses to set a date for halting its growth in emissions. One government official said: “This is nowhere near enough. The rest of the world only cares about tangible US emissions reductions. Until they come up with firm figures for reductions, the rest is meaningless.”

2008/02/27: NYT: Binding Emissions Treaty Still a Possibility, U.S. SaysA senior White House official on Tuesday outlined a new tactic aimed at convincing a skeptical Europe that the Bush administration would support a meaningful agreement to limit global warming. The official, James L. Connaughton, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, said the United States could accept a binding treaty if it included mandatory steps by China and other big developing countries as well

2008/02/25: Yahoo: UN climate head: US stand a `nonstarter’The U.N. climate chief on Monday welcomed statements by Bush administration officials that the United States would accept a binding international commitment to reduce global-warming gases. But he said their insistence that China and other developing nations do the same “is not realistic.”

2008/02/25: BBC: US to set ‘binding’ climate goalsThe US is ready to accept “binding international obligations” on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, officials say, if other nations do the same. The comments came in a news conference in Paris given by James Connaughton and Daniel Price, environmental and economics advisers to President Bush. The US hopes the world’s major economies will conclude a “leaders’ declaration” before the July G8 summit. There was no indication of how much the US might be prepared to cut emissions

There is more on food & food prices below, but it is worth headlining that an incident of panic buying hit the wheat market this week:

2008/02/25: FTimes: Wheat prices in biggest one-day risePrices of top-quality wheat jumped 25 per cent to a record high on Monday in their largest one-day increase as Kazakhstan, one of the largest grain exporters, said it would impose export tariffs to curb sales. The move, which follows similar export restrictions in Russia and Argentina, is likely to put further pressure on already tight global wheat supplies, analysts said

2008/02/26: BBC: Fresh records for price of wheatWheat prices have hit record levels as supplies dwindle, raising concerns about growing food inflation. Chicago Board of Trade (CBOT) wheat for delivery in March rose the maximum 90 cents allowed to $11.99 a bushel in electronic trading in Asia. High-protein spring wheat on the Minneapolis Grain Exchange rose by almost 25% to record levels on Monday. Kazakhstan has become the latest country to put export restrictions on wheat as it battles against inflation. Russia and Argentina have already imposed similar export restrictions. [Weather worries] The 25% rise in Minneapolis on Monday came after all trading restrictions were scrapped. The March futures contract closed at up $4.75 at $24 a bushel, the record price for any US wheat contract. The price of spring wheat has more than doubled since January. Reports of a drought in Northern China, where most of the country’s wheat is grown, also pushed prices higher. Extreme weather has already damaged crops in other parts of the world and US wheat inventories are expected to fall to their lowest level for 60 years

2008/02/26: BBC: Troops sent to stem Amazon lossSome 160 Brazilian troops have been sent to the Amazon to join hundreds of police officers involved in efforts to tackle illegal deforestation. The move follows clashes last week when local people and sawmill workers forced environmental officials out of the town of Tailandia in the state of Para. Officials say they do not want more confrontations but the operation against illegal logging will go on. Deforestation in the Amazon jungle rose sharply in the second half of 2007

And the troubling matter of falling food production is not going away:

2008/03/01: NYT: My Forbidden Fruits (and Vegetables)If you’ve stood in line at a farmers’ market recently, you know that the local food movement is thriving, to the point that small farmers are having a tough time keeping up with the demand. But consumers who would like to be able to buy local fruits and vegetables not just at farmers’ markets, but also in the produce aisle of their supermarket, will be dismayed to learn that the federal government works deliberately and forcefully to prevent the local food movement from expanding. And the barriers that the United States Department of Agriculture has put in place will be extended when the farm bill that House and Senate negotiators are working on now goes into effect

2008/02/26: IPSNews: Economy-China: Staring At Grain ImportsWith global food prices on an upward spiral, China is facing renewed fears that its growing demand for grain to feed the world’s largest population may lead to imports from international markets, driving prices higher and spurring further food inflation

2008/02/26: Guardian(UK): Promised green revolution still seems a long way offClimate change will have a profound impact on agriculture in the coming decades, either directly or indirectly. An increase in extreme weather will lead to poor harvests – a trend that has already started – and demand for biofuel will take land away from food production. Other factors such as urbanisation and increased demand for meat and dairy products in developing countries will also increase demands for food.

2008/02/25: UN: Green investment requires predictable carbon price, ministers agree at UN meetingPredictable carbon pricing is needed to direct world investment flows toward an economy that could minimize climate change, close to 140 governments agreed today as they concluded a major meeting on the subject in Monaco, the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) says. “Sufficiently high and long-term predictable price for carbon will be central for mobilizing capital for the new economy,” according to the summary by Roberto Dobles, Costa Rican Environment and Energy Minister and President of UNEP’s Governing Council/Global Ministerial Environment Forum, which ended Friday, and discussed the theme of “Mobilizing Finance for the Climate Challenge.”

2008/02/26: TerraDaily: EU official heads to US to discuss greenhouse gas dealEU Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas travelled Monday to the United States for talks on a possible binding international agreement on reducing greenhouse gases, his spokeswoman said. The news came after a senior White House official announced in Paris that the US is ready to accept “binding international obligations” to cut emissions of the gases blamed for global warming. “Commissioner Dimas is on his way to the United States for discussions with US authorities on the details of a possible agreement… on an international accord after 2012,” the spokeswoman said in Brussels. “There’s a whole UN process under way as well and in that context we are discussing with the US but with other partners as well,” she added.

2008/02/28: SeattlePI: Energy Taxes: Rocket launchThe economy or the environment? How about both? Congress approved Wednesday $18 billion in new oil company taxes, money that will be used to spur investment in wind, solar and alternative sources. There is a hard truth at work here. The rising price of gasoline is the quickest way to wean this country from foreign oil. If gas hits $4 a gallon soon, most consumers will do two things: They will drive less. And they will look for workable alternatives — vehicles that will be propelled by alternative energy if the price is right.

People are noting the influence of Big Coal:

2008/03/01: WaPo: U.S. Won’t Finance Montana Coal PlantThe Agriculture Department’s Rural Utilities Service will not provide financing for a controversial coal plant proposed by a Montana electricity cooperative, an agency spokesman said yesterday. The RUS, which provides low-cost financing to rural electric cooperatives, will not help Southern Montana Electric Generation & Transmission build a 250-megawatt coal-fired plant “because of cost and timing,” said RUS spokesman Jay Fletcher. He would not elaborate.

2008/02/25: CBC: Greenpeace activists arrested after climbing on top of planeFour members of Greenpeace have been arrested after climbing atop a plane at London’s Heathrow Airport and unfurling a banner protesting climate change. The environmentalists walked across the airport tarmac and climbed onto the British Airways Airbus A380 after it landed on a domestic flight from Manchester. The two men and two women wrapped a banner around the tail fin reading: Climate Emergency — No Third Runway. Greenpeace opposes plans for a third runway at Heathrow, Europe’s busiest airport.

2008/02/27: BBC: Day to ‘save energy and climate’Energy Saving Day, a 24-hour initiative aiming to reduce the UK’s electricity use, begins on Wednesday evening. A coalition of environmental groups, religious leaders and energy companies is asking people to curb climate change by turning off devices not in use. The National Grid will monitor how much difference it makes to consumption, while power companies will identify customers wanting home insulation. The BBC News website will be displaying results in close to real time

An initiative in Switzerland:

2008/02/29: SwissInfo: People power prepares to fight global warmingA people’s initiative calling for the government to slash greenhouse gases by 30 per cent by 2020 is set to come to a nationwide vote. Pressure is mounting on the authorities to do more to fight global warming in Switzerland, especially after the government’s latest package of measures met with a mixed response. Green groups and centre-left parties handed in their initiative to the Federal Chancellery in the capital, Bern, on Friday. They managed to collect more than 150,000 signatures in just a year. To force a vote, 100,000 signatures have to be collected in 18 months under Switzerland’s system of direct democracy.

2008/02/25: TheAge: What we can do nowSome parts of tackling climate change will be expensive. Some will be cheap. One goal of policy should be to bring on the cheap bits, so we have time to tackle the bits that will cost us. Ross Garnaut’s interim report on climate change has put Australia back on track to develop an effective climate change policy, after the false start of last year’s Shergold report. No one reading it can doubt Garnaut’s commitment to design an emissions trading system that is effective, comprehensive and beyond rorting. But not all key players want that. Ignore the lunatic fringe who argue that (a) global warming is a myth, and (b) if it’s not, fossil fuels are not to blame, and (c) if they are, we should let Bangladesh sink rather than put up petrol and electricity prices. Those people will chirp on forever. I’m talking about serious people, who run big companies that stand to lose when a price is put on carbon. Known as “the greenhouse mafia”, they include mining companies, electricity generators, and emission-intensive manufacturers

2008/02/26: SMH: Greenhouse gases to grow 20% by 2020Australia will meet its Kyoto Protocol emissions targets but greenhouse pollution is growing, mainly due to heavy reliance on coal for electricity. A report from the Federal Government’s Department of Climate Change shows that although the rate of growth is slowing, Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions are likely to increase by 20 per cent by 2020

2008/02/25: CanWest: Carbon report says tax could save Canadians moneyThe average Canadian would see a 50 per cent income tax cut if the federal government phased in a new tax to crack down on activities that produce the pollution linked to global warming, a new report said Monday. “There is a lingering misconception that a carbon price is nothing more than a tax grab,” said the report, Pricing Carbon: Saving Green – a carbon price to lower emissions, taxes and barriers to green technology. “While the receipt of substantial revenue – more than $50 billion per year – accompanies any effective carbon price, the revenue is simply the byproduct of putting a price on carbon emissions.” The study was unveiled jointly by environmentalist David Suzuki and Mark Jaccard, an economist and professor from Simon Fraser University who heads a consulting firm that produced the report

2008/02/25: G&M: Climate change plan could trigger tax cuts: SuzukiDavid Suzuki is trying to speak Stephen Harper’s language, releasing a report Monday that argues a strong climate change plan could produce deep income tax cuts. The well-known environmentalist and Simon Fraser University economist Mark Jaccard released a report Monday morning on Parliament Hill that outlines various options for Ottawa to implement a carbon tax or other ways of forcing polluters to pay for their environmental impacts. The report argues that making polluters pay a fee for every tonne of greenhouse gases emitted into the atmosphere could raise between $50-billion and $100-billion in revenue annually by 2020. The report argues that most of that revenue could be used to greatly reduce personal income taxes

That investigation into Friends of Science – Tories linkage is still festering:

Late comment on BC’s carbon tax:

2008/02/29: GeorgiaStraight: Carbon tax “classic” Gordo: Gordon PriceLong-time NPA councillor Gordon Price is calling the B.C. Liberal’s new carbon tax a “classic Gordon Campbell” move. Price should know. He was on Vancouver city council between 1986 and 2002 — seven of those years alongside then — NPA mayor Campbell. He said the genius here is that Campbell “can’t be outflanked on the right”. “But it is just a huge message, almost a slap, to those who had been thinking about climate change as a debate you would have around junk science — a marginal issue,” Price told the Straight by phone from a Paris sustainability conference. “I think the implications of it [the carbon tax] are profound. I will tell you the world over here takes the whole issue at a completely different level of seriousness.”

2008/02/26: G&M: Environment trumps economy, Stelmach saysAlberta Tory leader trumpets emissions targets but falls short of calling for controls on oil-and-gas developments Alberta Progressive Conservative Leader Ed Stelmach has been steadfast about not putting the brakes on oil sands development, but in a surprising about-face in the midst of a provincial election campaign, he suggested yesterday that environmental policy may trump economics.

A group has suggested a partial oil-sands moratorium in Alberta:

2008/02/25: G&M: Oil patch split over partial moratoriumA business-led lobbying effort to create a partial moratorium on oil sands development in order to free up conservation land has divided Canada’s major energy companies, while a government decision on the issue will likely be delayed until after next Monday’s provincial election.

The betting meme rolls on:

2008/02/22: DurangoHerald: Warming skeptic gets taker on wagerThe Durango resident who stirred public debate with a $5,000 wager that the Earth’s average temperature in 2017 would be lower than in 2007 has an official taker – albeit to slightly different conditions. Dr. Richard Grossman, a Durango gynecologist and obstetrician and occasional columnist for The Durango Herald, waited until the dust settled to work out conditions of the bet with Roger W. Cohen, who issued the challenge

The arithmetic of coal carbon is striking home:

2008/03/01: WaPo: ‘Clean’ Coal? Don’t Try to Shovel That[…] Clean coal: Never was there an oxymoron more insidious, or more dangerous to our public health. Invoked as often by the Democratic presidential candidates as by the Republicans and by liberals and conservatives alike, this slogan has blindsided any meaningful progress toward a sustainable energy policy

2008/02/28: CNN: The ethanol boom is running out of gas as corn prices spikeCargill announces it’s scrapping plans for a $200 million ethanol plant near Topeka, Kan. A judge approves the bankruptcy sale of an unfinished ethanol plant in Canton, Ill.. And that was just Tuesday. Indeed, plans for as many as 50 new ethanol plants have been shelved in recent months, as Wall Street pulls back from the sector, says Paul Ho, a Credit Suisse investment banker specializing in alternative energy. Financing for new ethanol plants, Ho says, “has been shut down.”

Meanwhile in the greenwashing chronicles:

Insurance and re-insurance companies are feeling the heat:

2008/03/02: SMH: Storms batter IAG’s first-half profitsThe dark clouds over Insurance Australia Group and its embattled chief executive, Michael Hawker, show few signs of lifting after the worst storms in NSW and Queensland since 1999 and a deluge not seen in Britain for 260 years devastated its first-half profits

P.S. Recent postings can be found in the week archive and the ancient postings can be accessed here, which should open to this.

“In 1776, the Scottish philosopher and economist Adam Smith (1723 – 1790) devoted a chapter of _The Wealth of Nations_ to illustrating the (benificent in his case) unintended social consequences of individual actions, and contemporary economists have developed many more illustrations. In 1963, the ecologist Garrett Hardin proposed a First Law of Ecology: ‘We can never do merely one thing.’ He intended to suggest that every action has ‘at least one unwanted consequence.’ For me, ‘never’ is a strong word, and not every unintended consequence is necessarily unwanted. But it is difficult to do one thing without entailing additional and often unexpected consequences. Even inaction achieves its desired consequences imperfectly, as Neville Chamberlain (1869-1940) discovered on the eve of World War II. I propose a Law of Action: it is difficult to do just what you intended to do.” -J.E.Cohen, page 75, _How Many People Can The Earth Support?_